Various types of beverages or products are stored in different types of containers for eventual consumption by consumers. Beverages and other products are typically filled in containers such as thermoplastic or glass liquid containers in an automated filling process. The product, the container, and container closure, such as a cap, must all be sterilized, or free from microorganisms, to provide the consumer with a safe product that has the respective quality attributes expected by the consumer.
Typically containers can be filled with beverages in either a “cold-fill” process or a “hot-fill” process. FIG. 1 discloses a block diagram of one type of container filling and capping apparatus, typically used in a cold-fill process. FIG. 2 shows a process flow diagram of a typical aseptic cold-fill process. In cold-fill applications, the beverage product is heated to an elevated temperature for a specific time interval to kill any microorganisms (referred to as pasteurization) and is then cooled to generally ambient temperatures. Pre-sterilized containers are then filled with the cooled sterilized product in a filler 11 and the containers are capped with pre-sterilized caps by a capper 13.
In order to ensure a safe product for the consumer, the filling area in a cold-fill system must never be contaminated. Operators must wear hygienic suits, and anything that enters into the aseptic chamber must be sterilized. If there is any suspicion that a contaminant has entered the aseptic environment, the process must be shutdown, and the system must be sterilized. Cleaning a contaminated aseptic environment back to aseptic standards, however, is time consuming. All cleaning and sterilization of the associated equipment must occur during a production stoppage, therefore limiting production capability. These factors make aseptic filling lines operationally cumbersome.
In the hot-fill process, the hot beverage itself is used to sterilize the containers at the filling stage. As depicted in FIG. 3, in hot-fill applications, empty containers are initially rinsed and then filled by a filler 11 with a beverage that has been heated to an elevated temperature for sterilization. The hot beverage is not hot enough to affect the container functionality or to deform the container. In a concurrent path, caps are provided and placed on the containers immediately after filling by a capper 13. Once capped, the containers are inverted, such that the caps and the headspaces of the containers are sterilized utilizing the heated product in a cap sterilizer 15. The capped containers are then allowed to cool for further processing in a cooling tunnel 17.
In such hot-fill processes, the containers used must have a robust wall construction that can resist the high temperature of the hot beverage. The overall process requires the container to be able to withstand inversion of the container by grippers, and, therefore, requires the containers to be of a heavier weight thereby increasing material costs. In addition, as the beverage and container are cooled, a vacuum is experienced inside the capped container due to material shrinkage. Because of this vacuum, the container must have vacuum panels to absorb the shrinkage. Finally, since the beverage product must be such that the liquid remains hot for sufficient time to sterilize the container and caps, and then cooled, there is significant energy lost to the environment with the hot-fill process. These factors contribute to considerable material and operational costs of filling containers in a hot-fill process. Similar to the cold-fill process, cleaning of the hot-fill filler/capper equipment requires a stoppage of production, limiting the production capability.
An exemplary embodiment is provided to solve the problems discussed above and other problems, such as limited container design, and to provide advantages and aspects not provided by prior systems of this type. Nevertheless, the exemplary embodiments disclosed can be used to fill the containers described above. Additionally an exemplary embodiment is provided to provide more design freedom than prior systems of this type. A full discussion of the features and advantages of the disclosed exemplary embodiments is deferred to the following detailed description.